FROM the EDITORS:

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:Opinions expressed on the Insight Scoop weblog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Ignatius Press. Links on this weblog to articles do not necessarily imply agreement by the author or by Ignatius Press with the contents of the articles. Links are provided to foster discussion of important issues. Readers should make their own evaluations of the contents of such articles.

NEW & UPCOMING, available from IGNATIUS PRESS

Friday, July 19, 2013

Consensus and Inconvenient Evidence

Consensus and Inconvenient Evidence | Thomas M. Doran | CWR blog

If we are such reasonable people,
why are we becoming a nation of unreasoning and evidence-disdaining
cattle?

Our culture likes to flatter itself on
its broadminded, rational, even scientific approach to the issues of
our times. Many are proud to have put the “voodoo of religious
faith”, and everything that can’t be measured, behind them.

Matt Ridley, who recently “retired”
from authoring the Wall Street Journal’s Mind & Matter
(science) column, speaking about climate change, says, “…science
does not respect consensus. There was once widespread agreement about
phlogiston (a nonexistent element said to be a crucial part of
combustion), eugenics, the impossibility of continental drift, the
idea that genes were made of protein (not DNA) and stomach ulcers
were caused by stress, and so forth – all of which proved false.
Science, Richard Feynman once said, ‘is the belief in the ignorance
of experts’…So, yes, it is the evidence that persuades me whether
a theory is right or wrong, and no, I could not care less what the
‘consensus’ says.”

Ridley’s perspective can be applied
to many subjects and issues, small and big. For instance, the
consensus is that professional athletes need sports
psychologists, so – using golf as an example – why is there a
dearth of modern professionals with the tough-mindedness of a Sam
Snead, Ben Hogan, Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, or Tom Watson, men
who excelled at the game before sports psychology was in vogue?

The consensus is that modern visual art
(portraying a materialistic worldview) has displaced the
anachronistic and chauvinistic art of previous centuries, so why
would an exemplar of modern art, Salvador Dali, suggest that as
modern artists had come to believe in nothing, their art amounted to
nothing?

The consensus is that the natural
environment in the U.S. is deteriorating, though the great majority
of the evidence – declines in water/air-related illnesses,
significant water/air quality improvements, habitat creation,
sensitive species returning to once-polluted rivers, advancements in
treatment/recycle technologies, indicates that America’s natural
environment has been improving for decades, so why are so many people
convinced that America is experiencing an environmental crisis?

The consensus is that racial, ethnic,
gender, and sexual orientation “diversity” enriches academia and
workplaces, but where is the evidence that ethnic and sexual
diversity produces diversity in thinking, attitude, or perspective?
Why are there so many universities, populated with a “diverse”
faculty and student body, that can’t abide non-conforming thinking?